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City’s Lovable Looney!

A plentiful stream of side-splitting posts on Twitter and Instagram have turned Mendy into a social media sensation and the only thing more razor sharp than the 23-year-old’s wit are those persistent raids down City’s left side that, combined with Kyle Walker’s presence on the opposite flank, have revolutionised the club’s playing style under Pep Guardiola this season and catapulted them to the top of the Premier League. – The Telegraph.

He is absolutely adorable. He is our lovable looney who has rocked the Internet!

He is Benjamin Mendy and has become Manchester City‘s most loved player despite only having played only 5 times for us. Who is this guy?

He was born on the 17th July 1994 in Longjumeau in Northern France.

He is 23 years old and 1.85 cms tall. He signed his first professional contract with Ligue 2 side Le Havre7 days past his 17th birthday in July 2011. Almost exactly 2 years later he was signed by Olympique de Marseilles who under coach Élie Baup finished 2nd in Ligue 1 and qualified for the 2013-2014 Champions League. Apparently after Baup was replaced by Jose Anigo, former Marseille left-back Éric Di Meco claimed he would “eat a rat” if Mendy ever made the French national team…

The next manager of Marseilles was to be Marcelo Bielsa, and Mendy was given 33 starts in the 2014-2015 season as the team qualified for the Europa League. Mendy played for 5 different coaches at Marseilles before signing for Monaco in June 2016 on a 5-year contract.

Mendy then quickly began to make a name for himself in Ligue 1 both with his combative performances at left back as well as the accuracy of his crosses leading to goals for the principality. He was not without controversy though. After 6 months with the club, he was banned for 4 games for kicking the backside of Corantin Tolasso in a game at Lyon that earned him a dismissal.

As we all know Monaco made a run to the semi-final of the Champions league last season, a season in which Mendy became the most coveted full back in Europe for his aggression, barnstorming performances and assists for Monaco.

He finally signed for City on 24th July this year following a long period of media speculation for a reported fee of 52m GBP as a replacement for the outgoing Gael Clichy. This transfer fee surpassed the previous record for a defender, set 10 days prior by City for Kyle Walker. Mendy was the second Monaco star to sign for City following the earlier transfer of Bernardo Silva:

Mendy: “Bernardo ended up being the first one. The rest of us were on holiday when we suddenly got this round robin photo from him signing for Manchester City, which was a surprise because he was the only one who had never said where he was going or what his plans were! And then he knocked us all over with that picture – ‘I’ve done it, here I am’. After that it was like dominos falling.”

Unfortunately only 5 appearances later in a game against Crystal palace in a tussle with Andros Townsend, Mendy ruptured the anterior cruciate ligament in his right knee and was assessed to be unlikely to return this season. Guardiola has said that he hopes the Frenchman will be available to City once again should the club manage to reach the semi-final of the Champions League in 2018.

Interesting this. But probably not as interesting as his off-pitch activities.

Mendy first came to the attention of the wider blogosphere for his Twitter spat with MUFC-loving sycophant Duncan Castles when the Scotsman pre-empted the medical diagnosis by predicting the ACL injury before it was officially declared.

Castles turned out to be correct, but not before this happened:

This was received with much amusement by City fans, since Castles has long been a figure of fun for Citizens by masquerading as an impartial journalist whilst failing to conceal his United allegiances on countless occasions.

From there, City fans have since been treated to dozens of hilarious twitter comments from Mendy as the season progressed.

Next up was this comment when he drew the ire of pundits like Jamie Carragher and Frank Lampard and was given a stern and humourless lecture by the pair following an unfortunate headed own goal by Lewis Dunk in the City game against Brighton:

As amusing as it was, few people outside the City camp were able to see the funny side, yet the whole incident endeared Mendy to the City faithful as much for the youngster’s impudence as for the ridiculous moralising by the dozens of United-Liverpool loving media scribes and writers.

That seemed to be the end of that.

However the tweets continued and Mendy began to take on his own cult status despite not being involved on the pitch:

He’d clearly become a very popular player in the City dressing room despite his lack of action. Examples of humorous tweets are below:

And after being hit with a 60 quid parking ticket outside the restaurant Nando’s, another amusing exchange followed as reported here by the Mail.

Next came a series of witty exchanges with fellow City full-back Kyle Walker. In these, Mendy mocked his teammate for going down too easily in a challenge:

And when Walker appeared to have been nutmegged in a game…

Supporters of other teams are enjoying the fun too as can be seen in the tweet below:

Somewhere in the midst of all this, Mendy began to refer to City as the #sharkteam in his Twitter posts. The result was perhaps, inevitable and gave Citizens an opportunity to channel their late 1990s selves:

You can read the story of City‘s obsession with inflatables right here.

Another side-splitter was this one when City fans may possibly have thought for one moment that Kylian Mbappe might be joining Mendy at City:

And then of course there were those tweets responding to moments of high drama in matches. Many City fans fell in love with Mendy all over again in City‘s Champions league first group game with Napoli.

An image of a brick wall was posted when Ederson saved Dries Mertens‘ penalty. However the image was hilariously updated when Diawara scored from the spot later on in the game:

The zaniness doesn’t begin and end with the Tweets though. For a man recovering from a ruptured anterior cruciate ligament, videos like these might not impress Pep too much:

The great thing about the arrival of Benjamin Mendy is not just what he brings on the pitch but rather the enormous contribution he brings to team morale, the positive atmosphere in the dressing room and the sense that there is an incredible joie de vivre among the players that adds the X-factor to City‘s performances.